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Survivor Series (2018)
Survivor Series (2018) was a professional wrestling pay-per-view (PPV) event and WWE Network event produced by WWE for the Raw and SmackDown brands. It took place on November 18, 2018 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, California. It was the thirty-third event under the Survivor Series chronology. Eight matches were contested at the event, including one on the pre-show. The card was highlighted by two traditional Survivor Series elimination matches: Raw was victorious over SmackDown in both the men's and women's elimination matches. In the main event, Raw's Universal Champion Brock Lesnar defeated SmackDown's WWE Champion Daniel Bryan. Also on the card, Raw Women's Champion Ronda Rousey defeated SmackDown's Charlotte Flair via disqualification and Buddy Murphy retained the WWE Cruiserweight Championship against Mustafa Ali in the only title defense on the card, as well as the only non-inter-promotional match. Raw won brand supremacy with a clean sweep by defeating SmackDown in all inter-promotional matches on the main card. The only match SmackDown won was on the pre-show, in which Team SmackDown's tag teams defeated Team Raw's in a Survivor Series tag team elimination match. Production Background Like the previous year, the theme of Survivor Series is "brand supremacy", with champions of the Raw brand facing their counterparts of the SmackDown brand in non-title matches: the Universal Champion against the WWE Champion, the Intercontinental Champion against the United States Champion, and the Raw Tag Team Champions against the SmackDown Tag Team Champions. A match featuring the the Raw Women's Championagainst the SmackDown Women's Champion was also to occur, but was called off due to the SmackDown Women's Champion sustaining a legitimate injury just days prior to the event. The Raw Women's Champion was instead scheduled to face a former SmackDown Women's Champion in a non-title match. Also, as the WWE Cruiserweight Championship does not have a SmackDown counterpart, it will be the only title defended on the show. Three traditional Survivor Series elimination matches will also occur. Two will be standard 5-on-5 matches, pitting five male and female wrestlers from Raw against five male and female wrestlers from SmackDown, respectively, while the third, which will occur on the pre-show, will be a 5-on-5 tag team elimination match, featuring five tag teams from Raw against five tag teams from SmackDown. Storylines The card consisted of eight matches, including one on the pre-show, that resulted from scripted storylines, where wrestlers portrayed villains, heroes, or less distinguishable characters in scripted events that built tension and culminated in a wrestling match or series of matches, with results predetermined by WWE's writers on the Raw, SmackDown, and 205 Live brands. Storylines were produced on WWE's weekly television shows, Monday Night Raw, SmackDown Live and the cruiserweight-exclusive 205 Live. At Evolution, Ronda Rousey defeated Nikki Bella to retain the Raw Women's Championship while Becky Lynch defeated Charlotte Flair in a Last Woman Standing match to retain the SmackDown Women's Championship. During a backstage interview following her win, Rousey was confronted by Lynch and an inter-promotional non-title match between the two champions was scheduled for Survivor Series the following night on Raw. On the November 12 episode of Raw, Lynch led the SmackDown women's division in an invasion of Raw and applied the "Dis-arm-her" on Rousey. During the melee, Lynch suffered a legit broken nose and concussion following a punch from Nia Jax. Due to the injury, Lynch was pulled from the Survivor Series match and chose Flair as her replacement. At Crown Jewel, AJ Styles defeated Samoa Joe to retain the WWE Championship, while Brock Lesnar defeated Braun Strowman to win the vacant Universal Championship, setting up a rematch between Styles and Lesnar from the previous year's event. However, on the final SmackDown before Survivor Series, Daniel Bryan defeated Styles to become the WWE Champion, thus replacing Styles as Lesnar's opponent. After the match, Bryan attacked Styles, turning into a villain in the process. During the Crown Jewel pre-show, Shinsuke Nakamura defeated Rusev to retain the United States Championship. Following the event, a match between Nakamura and Intercontinental Champion Seth Rollins was scheduled for Survivor Series. At Crown Jewel, The Bar (Cesaro and Sheamus) retained the SmackDown Tag Team Championship against The New Day (represented by Big E and Kofi Kingston), while on the November 5 episode of Raw, AOP (Akam and Rezar) defeated Seth Rollins in a handicap match to become the new Raw Tag Team Champions. A match between the two teams was then scheduled for Survivor Series. At Super Show-Down, Buddy Murphy defeated Cedric Alexander to win the WWE Cruiserweight Championship. On the October 31 episode of 205 Live, Mustafa Ali defeated Tony Nese to become the number one contender, and his championship match against Murphy was scheduled for Survivor Series. On the November 5 episode of Raw, Acting Raw General Manager Baron Corbin revealed Braun Strowman, Dolph Ziggler, and Drew McIntyre as the first three members of Team Raw's men's team while naming himself as captain, although stating he would not compete due to his managerial position. Kurt Angle interjected, wanting to replace Corbin as captain, therefore Corbin had Angle face McIntyre where if Angle won, he would have been on the team; however, Angle lost. The following week, Finn Bálor defeated Ziggler in a match and returning Raw Commissioner Stephanie McMahon rewarded Bálor by adding him to the team. Later, Bobby Lashley won the final spot by defeating Elias. Also on that episode, Stephanie promised Strowman another Universal Championship match against Brock Lesnar and also a match against Corbin, who had cost Strowman his Universal title match at Crown Jewel (with Strowman choosing the stipulations for either match), if he could lead Raw to another victory over SmackDown and not touch Corbin until after the event. For Team SmackDown's men's team, on the November 6 episode of SmackDown, the brand's Commissioner Shane McMahon and General Manager Paige appointed The Miz and Daniel Bryan as co-captains of Team SmackDown. Miz and Bryan then added Shane to the team as he had won the WWE World Cup at Crown Jewel. Later, Rey Mysterio and Samoa Joe joined the team after defeating Andrade "Cien" Almas and Jeff Hardy, respectively. A brawl then ensued between Joe, Bryan, Miz, and Shane. The following week, Bryan was removed from Team SmackDown due to his actions and subsequent WWE Championship match victory against AJ Styles, therefore replacing Styles in the champion vs. champion match. Following that alteration, Hardy replaced him after defeating Almas. On the November 5 episode of Raw, Acting Raw General Manager Baron Corbin named Alexa Bliss as captain of Team Raw's women's team, but in a non-competing capacity due to injury. The following week, Bliss revealed Mickie James, Nia Jax, Tamina, and Natalya, who was absent, as her first four picks and revealed that the winner of a match between Bayley and Sasha Banks would be the final member. During the match, the women's team attacked Bayley and Banks, causing a no-contest ruling and Bliss said neither would be on the team and then introduced Ruby Riott as the final member. For Team SmackDown's women's team, on the November 6 episode of SmackDown, SmackDown General Manager Paige revealed Asuka, Carmella, Naomi, Sonya Deville, and Charlotte Flair as the members of Team SmackDown, but Flair did not show up; the previous week, Paige asked Flair to be captain, but Flair felt she was not the right person but said she would think about it. Flair was instead named Becky Lynch's replacement to face Ronda Rousey, and the final member of Team SmackDown was not revealed on the final SmackDown before Survivor Series. On the November 6 episode of SmackDown, The Usos (Jey Uso and Jimmy Uso) defeated The New Day (represented by Big E and Kofi Kingston) to become the captains of Team SmackDown in the 10-on-10 tag team elimination match. Immediately after the match, The Usos chose The New Day as their first pick. The following week, The Usos added Sanity (Eric Young, Alexander Wolfe, and Killian Dain), Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson, and The Colóns (Primo Colón and Epico Colón) to the team. On the November 12 episode of Raw, a tag team battle royal occurred to determine Team Raw's captains. The team of Bobby Roode and Chad Gable defeated The Revival (Dash Wilder and Scott Dawson), The B-Team (Bo Dallas and Curtis Axel), Lucha House Party (Gran Metalik, Kalisto, and Lince Dorado), The Ascension (Konnor and Viktor), and the team of Heath Slater and Rhyno to win the captaincy of Team Raw, composed of all of the teams in the battle royal except Slater and Rhyno (who were the first eliminated) and the tag team elimination match was scheduled for the Survivor Series pre-show. Aftermath Results Other on-screen personnel See also * List of WWE pay-per-view events * Survivor Series Category:Survivor Series Category:World Wrestling Entertainment pay-per-view events Category:2018 Pay-Per-View Events